The Kansas University Endowment Association’s fund-raising campaign has raised $404 million, officials announced Monday.

The KU First: Invest in Excellence campaign has a $500 million goal. It began in 1998 and concludes in 2004.

Forrest Hoglund of Dallas, a retired oil executive and the campaign’s chairman, said he was confident the campaign would net at least $500 million.

“It’s certainly a signal we’re going to be able to reach our goal,” Hoglund said of the campaign’s progress. “The excitement is still there to get this thing done. We’re highly confident we can do it.”

John Scarffe, communications director for the Endowment Association, said campaign organizers would be conducting fund-raising events across the nation in the next year. One is scheduled next month during the Big 12 men’s basketball tournament in Dallas.

Scarffe said that since a slow period after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, donations “are really starting to pick up nicely.”

Among the campaign’s accomplishments so far:

¢ KU Endowment Association¢ Outlook optimistic for ‘KU First’ (8-10-02)¢ KU First campaign takes hit after Sept. 11 (4-3-02)¢ Campaign objective: to put ‘KU First’ (6-17-01)

l Money for 15 construction projects, including a classroom building at the Edwards Campus in Overland Park, School of Engineering expansion, Dole Institute of Politics and Hoglund Brain Imaging Center at the Medical Center in Kansas City, Kan.

l Creating 230 scholarship funds, with another 56 pledged as estate gifts.

l Creating 30 professorship funds, with another 13 pledged as estate gifts.

Several large construction projects listed among the campaign’s goals haven’t yet been funded. Those include an undergraduate natural sciences laboratory and improvements at the Natural History Museum, Lied Center and Spencer Museum of Art.